Studies across the globe have found that married people tend to be happier than single people, Olga Khazan writes. What’s their secret?⁠ ⁠

Researchers attempting to explain this phenomenon fall into two camps. “Camp No. 1, that of cynical libertines like me,” Khazan writes, “believes that marriage doesn’t make you happy; rather, happy people get married.” In other words, the act of being married isn’t the thing that makes one happy. People who are happy to begin with get married and remain happy, whereas unhappy people remain unmarried and unhappy.⁠
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“In Camp No. 2 are the romantics, who believe that getting married makes you happy, because there’s something special about marriage,” Khazan continues. “The logic of this camp goes as follows: Close, supportive, long-term relationships make you happy. Finding those types of relationships through friendships is possible, but it’s hard. People move away; they get busy. Most friends don’t buy houses or raise children jointly—the kinds of activities that glue people together and force them to cooperate.”⁠
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For this camp, a spouse is like a super-friend. “A good spouse will buffer you from the stress of your job, your kids, your family of origin. They’ll give you emotional, and sometimes financial, support.”⁠
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In the end, happiness and marriage are different for everyone. Khazan writes that, for her, “getting married is more optical than emotional. I’m tired of being a woman pushing 40 who has a ‘boyfriend’ … He’s already my super-friend; now I just want to make it official.”⁠, exerpt from The Altantic

Take a Wife … Please!